Columbus is one of sixteen cities in North America that currently hosts the program, and their local organization maintains a website, Haylstorm. The Columbus chapter also maintains on online forum on the Al-Mahgrib website. These websites reveal that one of their seminars held earlier this month was attended by several hundred individuals.

A previous article at FrontPage, “Jihad U”, details how the for-college-credit Al-Mahgrib program, accredited by the Muslim Brotherhood-linked American Open University, features a curriculum that promotes Wahhabi extremism, rabid anti-Semitism and Holocaust denials, openly preaches a militaristic version of jihad, and anticipates the eventual conquest of Islam worldwide. The message of Al-Maghrib has raised concerns of other Muslim organizations that do not hold to Wahhabist doctrine, which comprise the vast majority of Muslims.

Both articles note that all six Al-Mahgrib instructors have been trained at Saudi universities that indoctrinate students in Wahhabism, and at least one instructor was interviewed by the Washington Post last September for an article on the Salafi interpretation of Islam, which advocates for a return to the “true” Islam of Mohammad and his 7th Century associates, and observes that the Al-Maghrib Institute was founded at a College Park, Maryland mosque known for its extremist interpretations of the Quran.